The present disclosure relates generally to an information tracking system and method.
Companies and individuals often utilize systems in order to electronically manage products and/or documents. Some systems are closed to the company/individual (i.e., data can be selectively added to and retrieved from the system by the employees of the company and/or by the individual), and other systems are open to a variety of companies/individuals (i.e., data can be selectively added to and retrieved from the system by the employees of the various companies and/or by the various individuals) who subscribe to such a system. When the system is open to a variety of users, many of the users may be involved in a single product and/or document workflow (e.g., a product track and trace workflow). In these instances, the products and/or documents themselves may be tied to a specific lifecycle (e.g., validation at point A, handoff to point B, validation at point B, etc.), or to a set of prescribed sequential activities that are to be performed. The provenance record (i.e., document pedigree) for such a workflow depends, at least in part, upon the specific lifecycle and the processing/handling of the document in accordance with this lifecycle.